We all know loneliness is devastating but did you know that as many as 1 in 10 of us say the TV is our main companion?

MeetUpMondays™ give hospitality businesses the opportunity to help change this, to show love for the community and to showcase their lovely, friendly pub, cafe, tea room or hotel lounge, as a place of warm welcome.

Due to the coronavirus (Covid-19) outbreak our wonderful MeetUpMondays™ hosts have been put under extreme pressure to adapt their businesses in order to ride out the global crisis. They have been coming up with creative ways to keep the isolated members of their community connected whilst they are unable to attend their MeetUps.

Here are some examples of the ways MeetUpMonday™ hosts have been active in supporting their communities during the pandemic who have been

moving their MeetUps online

hosting quizzes, raffles, bingo and disco nights over the internet

providing meals to the more vulnerable and isolated members of their communities

supporting key workers & NHS staff

sharing their chefs’ recipes whilst their restaurants are closed to the public

even creating an online ‘Social Distancing Shop’ to buy virtual beers which become actual beers for NHS workers!!

Please, please support your local pub, cafe or hospitality business, wherever it may be in the world, so that we will still have them when we come out of the other side of this pandemic!

MeetUpMondays™ was started by Mick Dore of The Alexandra pub, SW19 in January 2018 as he was fed up of reading about loneliness and decided to DO something. He is well worth following on Facebook and Twitter as he is an inspiration! His pub has been voted by Young’s as their community pub of the year 2018, and has also been voted Pub of the Year 2018 in the Merton Best Business Awards

So what did he do? Well, he began offering a couple of hours of free tea, coffee and sandwiches on a Monday lunchtime encouraging those in the local area who ‘are fed up with their own company’. This may be because they are a new mum, a home worker, out of work (for whatever reason) or an elderly person or couple who have started to feel isolated. Since the launch The Alexandra’s #MeetUpMondays has simply changed lives.

Ann Osborn, Director of the Rural Coffee Caravan then fell over #MeetUpMondays on Twitter and thought it was an absolutely brilliant idea. The Rural Coffee Caravan battles loneliness by delivering information and friendship across Suffolk, believing that information is power. They befriend people and offer them access to the information they need to empower them. The fit with MeetUpMondays™ was perfect!

Then Ann met Sally, Good Neighbour Schemedevelopment officer for Community Action Suffolk, another perfect fit! Sally’s work with Good Neighbour Schemes is focused on communities working together to ensure that everybody has somebody to call upon in times of need. MeetUpMondays™ can compliment an existing Good Neighbour Scheme, or can lead to a new Good Neighbour Scheme!